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another, but that we should deal with any differences between
us by the method of consultation.
" In the days when the League of Nations was at the height
of its prestige, I always used to think that one of its most
valuable features was the opportunity it gave of personal
contacts between the Ministers of the various members of the
League at their periodical meetings in Geneva. To-day such
opportunities are sadly limited, and if these personal contacts,
so indispensable to good understanding, are to be effected,
other means must be sought. Next month Lord Halifax and
I have planned a visit to Rome for the purpose of discussing
with the head of the Italian Government and his Ministers all
matters of common interest and concern. It may be that some
will once again be speculating upon who is the winner and who
the loser in these talks. That is not the spirit in which we
propose to undertake our journey. Rather has it been our
hope that we might find an atmosphere in which it could be
possible by personal interchange of thought better to under-
stand each other's point of view and by establishing a greater
mutual confidence to co-operate in one way or another in
further steps towards the general sense of stability and
security.
" That brings me to another point. All my political life
I have been a party man and I have taken my full share of the
knocks that accompany party conflict. But no one can go
through such experiences as have fallen to my lot in recent
months without feeling that the narrower aspects of internal
party controversy have lost much of their savour and much
of their importance. And so, too, I find it difficult to rouse
much excitement over different systems of government apart
from particular actions which may not necessarily be inherent
in the system. I am told that in some quarters it is supposed
that because I advocate coming to an understanding with
dictator countries I must therefore favour the system of
Nazism or Fascism. If that means that I should favour such
a system for my own country, the contrary is the case.
" To me, as I believe to the vast majority of my country-
men, the complete subordination of individual independence
to something which is called the State but which really only
means those who for the time being rule the State, would be